As expected, Fox News cut its ties with Sarah Palin on Friday. The former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential candidate had worn out her welcome at the network over the last year and her brand had lost a lot of its pizzazz after sitting out the 2012 presidential contest and new conservative voices had come to the fore. Though she remains a cult favorite among some on the right and a convenient punching bag for the left, in a party with a large cast of rising stars like Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, Chris Christie, Paul Ryan and with Rand Paul looking to expand his appeal beyond his father’s libertarian base, her hold on the affections of the Tea Party and/or the GOP base looks tenuous at best. It’s likely that Fox decided she was yesterday’s news.
Palin is taking the blow with her customary defiance. In her first interview since the announcement, she channeled John Paul Jones as she told Breitbart News that she “hadn’t yet begun to fight.” She spoke about the need for conservatives to go outside their comfort zone and to stop “preaching to the choir.” That’s good advice, though it’s hard to see how anyone as polarizing as Palin is going to get moderates to listen to anything she has to say.
While it’s not clear what her next step is, anyone who writes her off completely is bound to wind up looking silly. She lost a lot of her credibility when she resigned her governorship and then made a number of puzzling career choices, which did nothing but further marginalize her as a serious political figure. But the raw political talent that dazzled so many conservatives in 2008 is still there, even if she spent the last four years acting like a reality TV show star and alienating many people who once wished her well. The problem for Palin is not in finding another platform for her views (something that is all but a given in this era of social media and proliferating political websites) but that if she still harbors an ambition to be more than just another talking head, she’s going to have to something more than talk.
Palin’s shrinking fan base still hopes she will return to the fray in 2016. Her spring tour of the East Coast in 2011 just as the presidential race was starting demonstrated that she hadn’t lost her star power even if she seemed as unprepared as ever to face the scrutiny of a hostile press. But as the Republican Party licks its wounds from its second defeat at the hands of Barack Obama, most of those who will be considered for the job of leading it back to the White House have one thing in common that Palin lacks: job resumes that show that they either have the guts to fight the Democrats in Washington as Rubio, Ryan and Paul are doing or a record of showing how Republicans can run a state on conservative principles, as Jindal and Christie are proving.
Each of them has different virtues as well as different faults, but all have spent the time since Obama was first elected on the frontlines of the battle against liberalism. It may be that not having a job is something of an advantage in a presidential campaign, but as the years go by the more Palin has taken on the aspect of a celebrity rather than a politician, let alone a political thinker. Celebrity counts a lot in our day and age, but it cannot transform a person who has done everything in her power not to be taken seriously into the sort of person whom Republicans, let alone the general electorate, will trust with the fate of the nation.
Sarah Palin is still a relatively young woman and has a long career of advocacy in front of her. But if she really wants to get back in the political arena, at some point she’s going to have to demonstrate that she’s capable of doing something more than run her mouth. Facebook postings and Internet videos don’t compare well to running a state or standing up to the Democrats in Congress. Unless she decides to get back in the fight somewhere other than on the radio or TV, the odds are she’s going to spend 2016 and every other subsequent presidential year the same place she spent 2012: on the sidelines with fewer and fewer people paying attention to what she says or does.
Oh well. But at least she is still prettier than any of the Democratic women I've seen.(laughter)
Sarah Palin falls into the long line on the right who are instinctively Republican but have never been intellectual conservatives. Add to that a more explicit desire than most politicians for fame and fortune and you get someone as far from a Goldwater/Reagan conservative as you can get. n nChris Christie at least has the excuse that his anti conservative views are shrewd voting getting for the northeast. Palin is just someone who never really thought about all the issues, and I think she still hasn't after listening to her. n nShe does not come up with new ideas or have well thought out conservative principles. She was simply raised in a conservative and traditional Christian culture. People liked that she was authentic in her displays of this culture, but that is not enough to lead. n nLet us not forget that she was for the Bridge to Nowhere before she was against it. She is a pol first, conservative second. And she has terrible instincts for a pol.
Well I dunno. I follow her pretty closely and she seems to have thought things through fairly well. I do prefer Rand Paul these days. But Palin would be of more than some help to him – if she so chose. n nThe deal is 2016 is going to be about drug prohibition. Rand is better situated for that fight.
If Rand runs with legalizing any drugs – he will lose. I wish he would start another party – just like his Dad should have. Or get off the "radical" libertarian pose.
Jonathan, I do not think you could be further from reality. I am no Palin junkie, but you are selling her, and our base waaaay short. nTake a vacation this year in Branson MO, or any other location 40 miles from any town with more tha 500,000 people in it. Sarah is fine.
Well that seemed rather pointless. nThe voters will decide rather she is a voice to be listened to or not. nIt seems rather snarky and unseemly for a blogger to decree rather she has standing or not. nAgree or disagree with her positions on issues but spare the "non-East elite" from your personal likes and dislikes. n nFinally, what facts do you have that prove it was the FOX Corp decision and not hers as FOX has said on record?
Another attack on Sarah Palin by Jonathon Tobin – Surprise, Surprise! Your allies, sir, are all on the left on this issue. They started the vicious attacks on one of our most popular governors in recent memory – simply because she was McCain's running mate. They wouldn't stop, even after the election, because of her popularity among conservatives, so they began the accusations that required Alaska to spend on her defense – so she resigned. n nI strongly recommend that those readers who have not seen Stephen Bannon's movie,"The Undefeated," go to Netflix and watch it. She has more leadership experience, a more consistent conservative record and impeccable unmatched honesty. Her tackling of real world problems in Alaska have resulted in real solutions. Perhaps Mr, Tobin will tell us exactly what the positive outcomes were for all that so-called "Democrat-fighting" that Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, Chris Christie, Paul Ryan and Rand Paul have done. n nBTW, those of us out here in flyover country know full well that Chris Christie is first of all, not a conservative and secondly, he leans extra-heavy on big government handouts.
The notion that Chris Christie should be considered still a "rising star" in the GOP after his giant suck-up to Obama and his stabbing of the House GOP in the back just this month to try and extort another 30 billion dollars from the taxpayer that had NOTHING to do with hurricane relief should demonstrate the total worthlessness of Tobin's post, which falls nicely in the Jennifer Rubin tradition of other worthless posts about Sarah Palin.
As much as he's correct to scorn the skin-deep Sarah the entire list that Tobin tries to pass off as "rising stars" is as lame as per too usual for Tobin. n n
Your 'skin-deep' comment about Palin is … well, lets just say it's wrong, and judging by the lack of thumbs up clicks the comment has gotten it seems others know that too, and that is hopeful. n nThe thing is idubinsky, if you don't get Sarah Palin you just don't get it at all.
Mr Tobin never misses an opportunity to bash Sarah Palin. In 2011 he was wrong about Paul Revere and it looks like he’s wrong now. Both Palin’s people and Fox’s people have stated that Fox offered to renew her contract but she declined.
If Commentary is really trying to be less snotty (acknowledging they were wrong about Herman Wouk) getting rid of Tobin would be a good step.
If Romney had allowed Sarah Palin on stage at the republican convention, he would have won the election; he did neither and we have Obama.
Mr. Tobin: Please provide a link for your apparent exclusive that Fox terminated Palin’s contract. The link you’ve provided seems to imply the exact opposite of what you say it does.
Palin was denigrated and mocked by MSM and Hollywood to the point she became a liablity. I expect the same will happen with anyone in Republican Party decides to run for President/Vice President, unless Republicans quit hiding and stand up and support their candidates. Look at how Bobby Jindal called Republican Party the "stupid party". Yeh, that was real smart!
Another wimpy, limp, metrosexual, New Yawk Jewish Intellectual, Right School, Bi Coastal "Wet". Margaret Thatcher used to call men like you, Mr. Towelbin, "wet". aka squishy, equivocators, and toadies. Your dislike of anybody outside your Madhattan sandbox is pathetic. You didn't even get the reasons she left the governorship correct. n nWhy don't you do some work on some West Texas drilling rigs, so that your cojones can reverse their shriveled, retracted state?
Very effective parody of a hyperventilating,vituperative left -wing asshole.Well done.
The problem remains (and every thoughtful conservative knows it) this: Sarah Palin is a poodlehead. n nShe is ill-read, ill-informed, and ill-educated. She has no apparent intellectual curiosity of any kind. She surfs on celebrity. She trades on her looks. She traffics in cliché. She is just not very bright. n nLeaving office after only two years, she has been successfully tagged as a quitter, and has never overcome that image. Appearing on 'reality' TV shows didn't help. She preaches abstinence to the nation… but in her own family? Even FOX is happy to be done with her. Those 15 minutes ended a long time ago. n nThe right needs intelligent women capable of reading books, and writing them. Capable of speaking in sentences. Capable of taking the long view, and building a credible alternative to a President who is turning out to be one of the best-organized Democrats the nation has ever known. n nSarah Palin is simply not bright enough to do the job, much less lead the Free World — and even her hardiest admirers concede the point. When Gov Jindal talks about Republicans being "the stupid party", we all know who he is talking about. n nSorry, folks. Ms Palin may have the looks, but she does not have the brains. She has become the Dan Quayle of our time, and that's not pretty at all.
There was a leftie in 2008 (coulda been 2009) who heard her speak at an economic conference. n nHe didn't like her policies at all. But he said that she was very bright. n nPerhaps you have put the poodle on the wrong head.
"A leftie"? Who might that be? n nAl Sharpton? Michael Moore? Henry Wallace? John Steinbeck? n nCan you be more specific? If "a leftie" said she was "very bright", that would surely end the debate right there. No one could argue with THAT kind of evidence.
Your insecurity and disdain for concrete accomplishment is palpable, odious, and worthy of dismissal. I can smell your disease from here. n nFirstly, poodles are among the smartest dogs, as most real world people know. "She was successfully tagged…". Yes, by the Progresssive Pravda media, supine for the Democrats, a prolonged slobbering love affair. See Bernard Goldberg's book. As you say, it was an image. The problem was, it was not rooted in truth or Reality. This seems to make no difference to you. n nPeople who use unnecessary words with no meaning are stupid. Words are symbols, and supposed to represent a Reality worth considering. To you, evidently, form and fluff, and the acceptance of others are defining criteria. This tags you as weak, pusillanimous, mousy, and of the limp wristed, soft dormitory hands type who expects superficiality to open doors. n nFurthering your self parody is the statement that women of quality should write books. She has written 2 best sellers that | am aware of . Your inclusive of Bobby Jindal's stattements, past or present, as a derisive put on Palin is without basis or attribute, indicating your general sloth and shallow declaration. n nAs for accomplishment of Ms. Palin, her successful and highly ethical public service record is on par with any governor of any time. Her shepherding of a billion dollars pipeline through Alaska is a matter of record. She is a union member, a small business owner, and a strong woman. n nWhen you get your worthless, easy college degree, you will doubtless want to apply as a waiter the local Pancake House. Since you seem so cognitively simplex and a pooped personality, a Soros funded NGO job is waiting for you and other Sargent Schulzes of the world.
Ha ha. Very good! n n"Cognitively simplex". Good one! "Your inclusive of…" Excellent! "shallow declaration." Even better. "Highly ethical…" Wonderful! n nYours is as clever a parody of the semi-literate Sarah Palin as I have read in years. Bravo. n nBTW, as you know, Ms Palin did not "write" any books at all. The treatise "Going Rogue" was ghostwritten by Lynn Vincent, someone on the political far-right who does such work for a living. Can you guess who ghost-wrote "Heart of America"? n nIn the two short years she was Governor, before she quit, she managed little that she did not inherit, and mismanaged much that she attempted. Her record "… is on par with any Governor of any time" you say. Good one! And in only two years!! Even better. n nYour comments are a brilliant satire of the sort of audience she attracts: half-baked, half-informed, and more than half cuckoo. n nYou did leave out one of her best, though. In June of 1997, when Mayor, she declared her belief that man and dinosaurs co-existed. Wow. Hers is a scientific discovery of the sort that the entire world of science has overlooked. It's a startling achievement, when you really think about it. Near-unique, in fact. Science is grateful, and so are we. Who knew? n nAgain, thanks. Very well done.
Bravo! I imagine your reply was wasted on its target but reading it sure gave my faith and hope a boost. Lack of manhood meets lack of interest in acquiring critical thinking skills meets pop culture's vulgar libertine ethic yields well expressed hate for the best among us.
Maybe Jon does not know how conservative the party is. Bush made us leary after the pill bill, and that is why Romney lost. If we knew then what we know now…Bush would have never been elected. Rove, Bush, McConnell, Boehner. McCain Graham and Hatch, are all Republican mush! Not conservatives.
Tobin's sole salient point is that Sarah must get back into the struggle if she is to have influence going forward. Her absence from the Romney campaign this past Autumn was incomprehensible, no matter what the reason. n nFew people have the authenticity that Sarah and Todd Palin have to enable them to speak to exactly the kind of white, traditionalist, nationalist, socially conservative voters whose failure to show up at the polls on November 6 cost Romney and Mandel and several others the victories we needed them to win. n nIn 2008 when McCain gave up on Michigan, Sarah and Todd pleaded with the campaign to send them up there to continue the fight. "We can speak to those people," they said. They were right then and they should have done the same thing in Ohio in 2012. n nIf Sarah wants a political career she is going to have to gather a mass of voters behind her on an election day. Nothing else will do. If you doubt that, consider Newt Gingrich.
There will always be people who support and send money to a politician, no matter what their flaws. Palin and her family have been crying all the way to the bank since she resigned as Alaska governor.